Whatever power Ritalia had used to melt Ophelia’s weapons, she didn’t seem able to do it again. Our side surged towardher guard. Nassik sank into the shadows behind the remaining Engrossian soldiers.
The queen pulled a delicate dagger from her hip, surveying the fight unspooling before her.
One towering fae soldier swung an impossibly sharp, shining sword at me. I pivoted at the last moment, dodging a nasty slice to my ribs.Fuck, they moved like water, evading our blades as if we were simple rocks parting a current.
I brought my scythe down aiming to hook through his neck, but his long sword met the shaft. The impact jarred along my bones. He grinned down at me, canines shining.
“I’ve been waiting centuries to make you warriors bleed,” he hissed.
“Have you?” I taunted, taking a step back to lure him in. To get his guard to falter. “Keep dreaming.” At the last moment, I dropped my scythe, diving away from his blade. Coming up at his side, I swung out, fist meeting his jaw.
It was like steel against my bones, but he staggered.
And while he was recovering from the impact, I took the chance to circle him, unsheathing a small knife from the band at my chest and slicing across his throat.
“Sounds like he needs to dream bigger,” Tolek said, sliding into his rightful place at my side and meeting another guard. His chest heaved with the effort, his skin a bit pale as he sucked down a breath.
Where the fuck was Lancaster with that damn bargain? I’d kill him and end it.
“Or be a bit more original, at least,” Malakai added with a grunt as his own weapon caught a third fae.
I huffed a laugh. “A small-minded people, apparently.”
Out of the corner of my eye, silver glinted. I spun as a fae blade was dropping toward my shoulder?—
But a wall of silver-blue light exploded between us, melting the blade and freezing the fae as he collided with it.
Jezebel stood halfway up the steps, Zanox protecting her. She tossed shields of that myth-born death magic before our side of the fight where our speed wasn’t a match for the fae.
I nodded in thanks, then dove back to the enemy she’d blocked. Jezebel’s magic didn’t kill him. It did shock him, though. Enough for me to slide my sword into his heart.
He crashed to his knees, and I kicked him off my blade, thick crimson dripping to the cave floor.
Amid the fighting, my eyes flashed to Vale. She was braced with her short sword, a matching set of triple-bladed daggers at her hip. Her eyes glazed over for a moment. She was reading every move to know where to jump in next. A starsdamned genius, my Stargirl. I adjusted to stand in front of her while she was vulnerable.
Her magic had been so strong tonight. She told me before the Gates—after that Ascension reading and the Rites—she wanted to try to read more of the Angels, but right now, we needed her present here.
It only took her a split second to gather each reading her Fates were passing to her. Then, with a grimace, she charged at one of the fae.
And while Vale mainly used magic as her weapon, she was not inept with a blade. Far from it. She’d told us that she’d trained at the temple—that every acolyte was required to be sharp in every way that counted—but cursed fucking Angels, I hadn’t expected the swiftness and accuracy to be so enhanced since the last time I’d seen her fight.
It was like with those pieces Titus had stolen, she’d taken the gaping edges around the hollows and honed them. Turned them into a hardened form of what she was before and swore to allow no one to take from her ever again.
In the blink of an eye, she launched a dagger at a fae across the cavern with his eyes set on Santorina. The three blades were a blur of silver as they spun, slicing across his neck.
“That’s my fucking Stargirl!” I shouted, fighting to keep my attention on the fae advancing on me.
Barrett, Dax, and Celissia were weaving their way among the pointed-eared bastards with non-lethal blows. Enough to give the rest of us an opening, but their true target was clear: Nassik and the three Engrossian soldiers shielding him.
Over the chaos of finding my next opponent, I called to Malakai, “Mila?”
“Khrysaor” was all he grunted in response as he parried his attacker. One glance up to the theater seats showed a still-unconscious figure beneath Dynaxtar’s wing.
The sphinx perched at the highest step, watching ruin unfold below, but Sapphire…
“Cursed Spirits,” I murmured.
The pegasus flared her wings, no longer bleeding, and pranced impatiently in place. She may be a mythical creature, but she bore the heart of a warrior horse. And her distressed eyes were on her rider.
